1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates in general to programming development environments, and in particular, to the use of a database management system's infrastructure to invoke a stored procedure for creating and preparing a database application.
2. Description of Related Art
Computer systems incorporating a Relational DataBase Management System (RDBMS) using a Structured Query Language (SQL) interface are well known in the art. The SQL interface has evolved into a standard language for an RDBMS and has been adopted as such by both the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and the International Standards Organization (ISO).
Stored procedures are collections of pre-defined procedural programming statements that typically employ SQL to access relational databases managed by an RDBMS. Stored procedures for an RDBMS are not like procedures found in other high level languages. However, there are a number of benefits to using stored procedures in an RDBMS, including function encapsulation, performance improvements, client-server processing, and security.
Database applications often invoke stored procedures to handle some or all of their logic. However, a user first develops the database application in an interactive environment. This includes the steps of developing the source code, and then compiling, linking, and binding the source code to create the resulting executable modules. Unfortunately, these steps are often repetitive and time consuming. For example, the programmer has to develop a sequence of jobs to perform these various steps.
Thus, there is a need in the art for automated mechanisms for creating and preparing database applications. Moreover, there is a need in the art for techniques that use the RDBMS's own infrastructure to automate the preparation of database applications.